I am a self-professed Twitterholic -- that's someone who is addicted to Twitter. Truth be told, the changes on the channel have me keeping an eye on things from afar; yet, this remains my very favorite social media channel, and it should be yours, too.

For a global event, the Nuclear Industry Summit, ECI Communications was hired to promote the event with a website from scratch, a Twitter stream from scratch, public and media relations, and video production. It was a huge event with three months to pull it off. I was the Twitter peep behind the scenes for the entire event.

Twitter Nuclear Energy Story

This episode of The Heart of Marketing is a story about live tweeting for an event and what happens prior and beyond. It consists of my tips (I am Jayme Soulati, BTW) on how to use Twitter with best practice to realize the goals for the event.

There was strategy, a thoughtful approach to tweets, a very thoughtful approach to engagement, and a need to bone up on the subject matter quickly to be smart when tweeting. I can honestly share that Twitter was responsible for 90% of the traffic to the nascent website prior to the first multi-media news release being published.

Learn from this episode and please do consider Twitter as one of the best media for your event and even daily content marketing.

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A Nuclear Energy Case Study

In this episode of The Heart of Marketing, John Gregory Olson and Jayme Soulati share some stories about their own customer experiences that resonate with value, emotion, and making someone feel special. Jayme was recently a guest at the Grand Hyatt--Washington, DC for a global summit. As she social media-zed her experience in pictures and posted on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Foursquare, the Grand Hyatt was right there saying thanks. Then, a bowl of chips, dip and waters arrived in Jayme's room with a hand-written note of thanks. Can you guess how that made Jayme feel? Yes, special. And, that's what Tory Burch Sport is doing in NYC -- shaking up the customer experience with a run-way feel in the store and a spa-like relaxed setting for customers to have a seat, speak with designers, have a beverage, and talk style. For its first non-line store experience, Tory Sport is approaching customers drastically different -- on purpose. How can your business get in this groove? You do know that 'customer experience' is the new marketing buzzword, right? Well, we've talked all about this in Episode 55 on Experiential Marketing, with Trader Joe's and Grocers get local in Dayton, Ohio, too. The thread that ties it all up in a bow is value, emotion, feeling, and heartfulness. Can you make your customer feel heartful? What do we mean by that, anyway?  Listen in, and you'll soon understand what John and I mean. We couldn't resist bringing this story to you because even the Wall Street Journal is getting with the program and featuring Tory Burch Sport and customer experience.

Measuring the success of social media and content marketing is the Holy Grail; make that the illusive Holy Grail. Some do it extremely well, while others suffer attempting to put ROI against a content strategy.

The C-suite seems to ask for ROI against everything done within a company and that often comes without regard for the softer side of marketing (often called public relations).

In this episode of The Heart of Marketing, John Gregory Olson, the extraordinary producer of our show, and me (Jayme Soulati) wax and wane about what ROI means to content marketing and overall strategy.

This episode is my new epic favorite. I am so impressed with our topic as we cover:

1. Why ROI is not always the first best practice to put in place for content marketing

2. The empowered consumer and her control over the marketing funnel and sales decisions

3. Which metrics to put in place all the time that influence ROI

4. Why brands are failing in content marketing by attaching ROI to content

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Do take a look at Episode 2 on The Heart of Marketing where we address marketing ROI!

Adrienne Smith was our featured guest on Go for Heart -- 02; she's the consummate community builder and engagement professional.

We never knew how much culture mattered until John Gregory Olson and I began to take a closer look at the goings on at Zenefits (the company with sex in the stairwells and alcohol every day) and Volkswagen.

We've been exploring culture in our Workplace Series because culture IS your heart core. It's the alignment of heartful business practice with values, vision, and mission. When culture heads into a downward spiral, then an entire business suffers.

In this episode of The Heart of Marketing, we take a strategic look at why culture matters and its impact on stakeholders from customers on the outside and employees on the inside.

In the examples we showcase, the impact of negative culture is obvious in how the CEOs made change following negative incidents on the companies brands.

When was the last time you took a good look at your company culture? If you're a small or mid-sized company, you have an opportunity to develop the how and why of your company and to also change it up should you need to.

It's the responsibility of a marketer to align with the intended culture leadership seeks to create, grow and maintain. It's also important to put the best foot forward so people on the outside of a brand want to align with that company.

This episode is a double-listen. It is likely going to take you a few times to grasp all that we have to say as you align your thoughts and vision from how your brand is positioned to grow your company.

Culture is a funny thing in the workplace, and John Gregory Olson and Jayme Soulati take an inside view at how the mission statement shapes culture shapes productivity shapes the bottom line.

Did you know that? John drops a bombshell with this little factoid about happier employees, happier profitability; sad employees, even worse profitability.

In this episode, another in our Workplace Series, we take a look at several examples of companies like VW, Radio Flyer, Starbucks, and Zenefits. (You know the latter, right? Its culture was so disastrous that...you'll have to listen.)

Our discussion is a sister to our most-downloaded episode 'Specialists v. Generalists,' and if you've not listened yet to Episode 21, do take a listen and tell us why you like that one? It's baffling to us!

Which company do you know that has a fitting culture? We believe Trader Joe's fits its culture very well (we did an episode with this #RockHot company, too), and Starbucks, golden child of Wall Street, is a maverick when it comes to culture; and, its culture is aligned to its mission...

Is Yours?

We are The Heart of Marketing!

Our guest today on the The Heart of Marketing 'Go for Heart' special edition is a genuine and natural heart marketer. Ms. Adrienne Smith joins us with her delightful Southern Belle drawl and her blogging intellect that puts community and connections first. Connect with her on Twitter, and her natural gratitude will invite you in.  There is no other blog on the 'sphere with a comment section so alive and well. When you visit AdrienneSmith.net, you'll find the love everywhere and especially in the oodles of comments she gets and answers daily. Why is that? Simply put, Adrienne is the consummate relationship builder. She treats everyone with genuine appreciation and gratitude. Even on Twitter when she thanks someone for sharing material, her gratitude shines through, naturally. We are also grateful that Adrienne joined us to share her heartful story. We invited her here because she embodies the 5 Pillars of Heart Marketing -- helpfulness being one. When you listen to Adrienne, you will learn from her tips, appreciate her course, get to work building your own blog community and develop a heart core that people automatically gravitate towards. Adrienne isn't stilted; she isn't phony; she's the real deal, and it's our pleasure to introduce Adrienne Smith to you. 

This episode of The Heart of Marketing with John Gregory Olson and Jayme Soulati is a lot like our most-downloaded episode #21, 'Specialists v. Generalists.' And, we can't figure out why that one is so popular. Can you?

Here, we wax and wane on the topic of marketing consultants. Should you hire one? When is the best time? Why would you ever need one? And, most of all what benefit might you derive from investing in a marketing consultant.

Jayme and John paint the case for making the investment in a marketing consultant because they can:

1. Enhance an experience gap

2. Outfit bandwidth for a specialty project

3. Conduct an outsider audit to understand performance deficiency

4. Become the insider team

There may be a few more ways that come to light in this episode that you've not thought of in re your own growing business. Take a listen, and grab some thoughtstarters to push your business toward another growth goal.

This is a solid conversation with good perspective from the business and consulting sides.

We're delighted to bring you an Instagram expert in Jenn Herman, one of the top 'dogs' in Instagram marketing for newbies and established businesses. This episode on The Heart of Marketing has us (John Gregory Olson and Jayme Soulati) so excited.

Jenn Herman shares some basic tips that you can incorporate immediately into your Instagram channel, and here are some to whet your whistle:

1. You get 30 hashtags to use in each post; should you use them ALL? Listen to what Jenn has to say!

2. There's only one clickable link allowed in an Instagram profile/bio; did you know this? So what should you do if you want to promote a podcast episode or blog post? Jenn knows!

3. How frequent should your images be uploaded to Instagram? If you do 65 in one hour watch what happens to your followers! Jenn had that client experience and what does she recommend?

4. How much fun can you have with Instagram? Listen to what Jenn has to say about your bio and personality...can you be quirky or stodgy?

5. What if you're a service business? Is it possible to be successful with this unique channel?

6. OMgosh...those memes! Ever feel overwhelmed with peoples' quotes and memes? Jenn sets the record straight with the Instagram rules you should follow!

You're going to want to listen to this episode twice, no doubt. Jenn's talks rapidly and everything she says is a pro tip for Instagram power!

Resources

The Heart of Marketing

JennsTrendsBlog.com

Instagram: Jenns_Trends

Twitter: http://twitter.com/Jenns_Trends

Jayme Soulati

John Gregory Olson

You've been hacked, now what? Yes, it's inevitable. Your business will get hacked, whether solo, small, mid-sized, large, or largest. The Wall Street Journal published a story about Microsoft's new gazillion dollar cybersecurity center to fight off the hackers. How are you going to manage your cybersecurity crisis? This episode of The Heart of Marketing is really more about crisis communications and the preparation for an event much like a data breach. Jayme Soulati, that's me, is speaking to the Napa Valley Vintners to help wineries prepare for their response in event of a cybersecurity matter. Regardless of which industry in which you play and work, cybersecurity doesn't care. Hackers will take you down if you lack secure passwords, have not updated your software, don't have firewalls, do not have security plugins, do not encrypt your data, and don't know what your third-party vendors do for security. Once the crisis hits, and it will, how will you respond? A message map is number one, but there are also other basics like control your message, develop owned media with approved messages, stay calm and be accessible. Listen to our episode with John Gregory Olson and Jayme Soulati and see if we can teach you a few tips on responding during a crisis. It doesn't matter if it's cybersecurity or not; you can use what you hear for whichever matter you're managing.

We owe Christopher Beam, a journalist with Bloomberg BusinessWeek great applause for his story, Ancient Branding Secrets of The Shaolin Temple, that provides the core of today's episode on The Heart of Marketing.

Jayme Soulati and John Gregory Olson take a reverse look at media relations from the perspective of the journalist as he shares the story about Shi Yongxin and his escapades to turn a small monastery in China, The Shaolin Temple, into a tourist attraction in Australia.

The commercialization of culture could be the crisis communications story because Yongxin does everything wrong and gets caught in the process (yet his plan continues). The story is so fascinating and Jayme intended to share the elements of national news you need to know before earning a story in BusinessWeek or the Wall Street Journal.

This episode shares more tips for companies and business owners about the pitfalls of being targeted by media to tips for preparation should it happen. Jayme, a former media relations agency pro in Chicago's PR firms, talks about story elements, whether the media can be trusted, how social media is a negative during scandal, and more.

Resources

IKEA and the New Rules of News

Christopher Beam, Businessweek

The Heart of Marketing